Working first time!

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Working first time!

Postby mcm3m » Wed Dec 25, 2013 9:36 pm

Well almost, just had to switch IC3 & IC4 as possibly expected per the instructions. Also had to reverse the mis marked green LED. Assembled as a first time kit with my 14 yo granddaughter as our Christmas project(I am an experienced electronics hobbyist).

http://youtu.be/EfvGvtUsW7U

Day one was the orientation, solder training and main board build. Day two was interrupter and initial system testing. Initial low power testing uncovered the green LED problem. Day three was final assembly and final test. Each day was ~ 4-6 hours.

Since the manual makes a strong point on secondary grounding we used left over 14 AGW primary for this wire. Our secondary measured 225 ohms so we used five turns on the primary instead of six. Primary was wound CCW.

Set-up was per instructions and on the floor of an outdoor lanai. Nice 12-18" sparks with minimal flash-over. For the most part power was kept at or below just a hair above 1/2. Seems that occasional flash-over would start after about two minutes of music but was eliminated by reducing the power a bit. We played three plus minutes about six times tonight with at least five minute breaks. Primary was noticeably warm to the touch but secondary stayed cool after each play.

All in all a fun Christmas project with my granddaughter!
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Re: Working first time!

Postby E.TexasTesla » Thu Dec 26, 2013 10:20 am

Congratulations ! I hope some day when I have grand kids they show some interest in this hobby.

Did you add more coats to the secondary coil ? Might help with flashover.
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Re: Working first time!

Postby mcm3m » Thu Dec 26, 2013 11:01 am

Not yet but it's on our punch list!

Thanks,

Marc
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Re: Working first time!

Postby ican » Fri Dec 27, 2013 8:51 pm

You also want to pay attention to where you have the breakout point mounted... i saw a lot of back-end streamers, because the back of the breakout point is past the midpoint of the toroid. You can solve this by covering the end completely in electrical tape and sharpening the other end to a fine point. Additionally, you can bend the breakout point rod to wrap around the center bolt on the toroid, and completely eliminate any chance of the back-end streamers.

Very nice build... I didn't really see any flashovers in the video, and those are some mighty fine streamers for only being at 50% power. Time to pull out the oscilloscope if you continue to have flashovers... check your resonant frequencies and the secondary resistance. Not a lot of people have seen the updates thread, but if your secondary resistance is less than 218 or so ohms, you only need a 5 turn primary, which will reduce the flashovers, but will make the coil run slightly hotter. Merry Christmas
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Re: Working first time!

Postby mcm3m » Sat Dec 28, 2013 9:55 am

Thanks ican, 3 coats of Minwax gloss fast dry aerosol polyurethane and rounding the corners on the clips resolved the flashover!

Secondary resistance is about 225 ohms so we built the primary with 5 turns wound ccw. Power setting is now limited by ground strikes above about 5/8 power. Primary does get warm so plan to check the resonance when I can get my hands on a scope.

Happy New Year!
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